I grew up a Yankee fan, I favor Pitchers whenever possible, I am a stathead, and my dream job is to be a GM for an MLB franchise. In the summer, I go to MLB games and catch baseballs. In the winter, I write about what teams are doing to get better or worse. I try to be positive and unbiased in my writing, but that isn't always possible when evaluating teams truthfully.

1 Year anniversary of Observing Baseball

Wow. I truly cannot believe it has been only a year. When I created this blog last year, it had been a thought brewing in my mind for a few months. When my birthday came around (the night of October 12th/ the morning of October 13th)I figured I would just try something a little out of my comfort zone. I created the blog and named it Observing Baseball just because I like to see past the surface in things and it was going to be a baseball blog. I made the link mateofischer.mlblogs.com, not because I thought I would some day have 100 hits on the site each day, but because the blog was going to be me. More specifically, it was going to be my opinion on baseball. I then wrote the blog’s first entry at 12:52 on the morning of my birthday, the 13th.

October 14- My next entry is still one of the ones I have most pride in where I delved into all the great pitchers that were in the playoffs last year and broke them down showing the world and Ace they may not have considered before.

October 16- After that, the world got its first taste of Mateo Fischer randomness when Cablevision and News Corp engaged in a price negotiation at the Bronx’s expense. By the way, if you actually look carefully at the title of the entry, the blanked out word is actually “freaking” and not the word everyone would think to be blanked out. This is also where I got my first comment.

October 20- My next entry was my first taste of both the ballhawk style of blog entry and ALCS baseball. Thanks to the enormous generosity of my dad, I went on Ebay three days before the game and got us both a ticket for this game. It was one of the most unique experiences I have ever experienced and has really contributed to my entries this year. I am amazed by many things in this entry. First, when I re-read this entry, I was both impressed and disgusted at how quickly I got an entry of that magnitude up and how sloppy my writing is. Secondly, I am amazed by how good some of the pictures were for it being my first time blogging about a game and how random some of the other pictures were. Sure, I still have some random pictures in my entries but in this entry, the time I spent outside the gates had almost as much coverage as the time I spent inside the stadium. It was like I took pictures so I felt the need to use them in the entry.

November 1-30- Here is where I got my first taste of other thing getting in the way of blogging. In both entries, listed here and here, I found myself in the position of having to explain to the readership why I hadn’t been posting entries that often. The problem was that I was too ambitious but in retrospect I wish I would have finished the entries because there were maybe five people reading at this point and so I should have held future readers in mind because looking back on it, it just looks sloppy.

December 19th- This is the point where I realized that I didn’t have that many viewers and so I actually stuck through it and finished the whole entry. Sadly, I did write other entries in December but this is the only one that survived the WordPress conversion. Fortunately, this is another one of those entries I am very proud of. It is completely conspiracy theory but it does make sense when you think about it from the standpoint of a GM (which I aspire to be). The name of the entry is Pure Genius. It deals with the Cliff Lee acquisition by the Phillies last offseason and the moves that, intentionally or unintentionally, made that move possible (I argue that they would have been intentional if I were the GM of the Phillies and imply that Reuben Amaro might have done them intentionally).

January 2-6- New Years Resolution/Revision I initially made all of my all of goals for the 2011 ballhawking season in the New Years Resolution entry. Four days later in the New Years Revision, I went back on these goals because my dad’s test came back and his cancer looked much worse than I had perceived when I wrote the first entry.

January 27- This was one of those entries I am most proud of. When I first read Moneyball, I sort of understood the statistics themselves and how they worked but I didn’t truly understand why they worked better than the usual statistics. This is an explanation to those people in that fuzzy zone that get Sabermetric stats but don’t get why they work better. I will be the first to admit that I would probably do a much better job now of explaining the stats and that this entry is a bit awkward and confusing. The entry is aptly named, Sabermetrics (the explanation).

February 16-April 19- Offseason Recap and Review entries. This stemmed from me looking at things from a GM’s perspective. I just thought to myself that it would be fun to grade how the teams had done in the offseason. Little did I know, it would also be a great tool for communicating with the different fan bases of Mlblogs because I did do all 30 teams.

March 9-30 Fordham Prep Baseball I tried writing about Fordham Prep Baseball because I am already the manager for the team and I could have some insight along with recapping the games. It started with posting the varsity roster on the blog. I then recapped some games but it faded out because there was some criticism as to how I recapped the games and it was just taking up too much time so I stopped writing the entries. I will NOT be resuming this on this blog. If at all I start recapping games, it will be on another blog created specifically for Fordham Prep Baseball, but will most likely not happen.

March 10- In the first week of March, Zack Hample’s “The Baseball” with a subtitle I’d rather not write out, came out. I “Pre”-ordered and several days later on March 8th, it arrived. I then went onto do my first ever book review. I know absolutely nothing about how to review a book. So, I just went over each of the sections and added my own little commentary to go with that particular section. Here is the review in all of its overkilling-ness, The Baseball Book Review.

March 17- This was just a play I had in my mind forever and wanted to get out into the world. I realized that I could put it on my blog and so the Super Bunt became a blog entry. What do you think? Could it actually work?

March 27- I know you are sick of entries that “I am very proud of” but here’s another. The Survey of Adult’s Perception of Baseball is close to, if not the entry I have/will put the most effort into. It is basically me seeing how adults view baseball as a sport through asking my teachers who their favorite players are and why.

April 27- I copied and pasted a research essay I did for English on the moral standard held by baseball throughout the years. I did this by examining who was being let into the Hall of Fame and whether or not they deserved it according to the rules for the BWAA for voting. I looked at Mark McGwire, Ty Cobb, and I believe Pete Rose. The entry was called, Case Study on the Morality in Baseball. It may be a bit drier than you are used to from me because it was for a class but it certainly has some interesting information. You might be surprised by what you find.

May 6- about June I was going to games fairly infrequently as you can see from the distance between blog entries. This was because my dad was in hospice care and I was trying to spend as much time as I could with him after Fordham Prep Baseball ended. He died May, 17, 2011. To show how much I love baseball, I went to a game that night. Granted it got rained out but still.

June 19- August 4 I don’t want to say that I caught fire because that carries the implication that I was overachieving but something certainly clicked for me in all the games between these two points. Coincidentally, (this is sarcasm) I was not in New York for any part except for but one game of this hot streak. The schedule consisted of: June 15-16 Nationals Park, June 24 AT&T Park, July 2 Tropicana Field (where I snagged my 100th ball), July 4-6 Turner Field, July 7-9 Sun Life Stadium, July 18 Citi Field, July 22-24 Camden Yards, and July 27-29 Nationals Park.

August 4- September 23 I went on an even colder streak than the last one was hot. Not coincidentally, there were a whole bunch of Citi Field games. The streak was so bad I actually ended my consecutive games streak at 56. I think my average for this stretch was a little over 1 ball a game. This included a trip to the Midwest where I wasn’t as prepared as I would like for games because I was visiting like 10,000 colleges.

Now we are pretty much up to date. Like I said, it was a crazy year. This blog started out as just something to do but it has evolved into something so much greater. I have been able to be in communication with so many more people because of it and now can’t imagine my life without it. It has even affected my college search so much as that I am actually considering Journalism as a serious major. Last year, I would have gone on a hunger strike before I applied to a school for Journalism. This year, I am actually applying to Northwestern, the top Journalism school in the country.

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My Social Media Sites

Instagram Profile
My Instagram profile, where I post some nice pictures of baseball or other life things. You can even see my four most recent pictures in a widget further down on this sidebar.

My YouTube Channel
I highly recommend this over any of the other sites. Here I make content that sometimes overlaps with the blog, but is a medium like the blog in it of itself; unlike the other sites, which are just supplementary to both my YouTube channel and the blog.

Observing Baseball Facebook Page
The Observing Baseball Facebook page, where in addition to being notified of whenever I post an entry (You have to “like” it first, though.) you can also get a behind-the-scenes look at all of the entries as I post all of the pictures I took during any gi

Twitter Account
My Twitter account, where I keep you up-to-date on blog/baseball happenings. See below to look at some of my most recent tweets. tweets

Ballhawking Sites

Cook & Sons' Baseball Adventures
Although most ballhawking blogs are, Todd Cook’s narrative of his and his sons’ adventures going to ballparks is the closest thing there is to a father-son-baseball written reality show.

Hit Tracker
An amazing tool that was responsible for my success at Yankee Stadium in 2010. See Season end review (Nov, 1, 2010) if you want to see the difference @ Yankee Stadium.

My Game Balls
The ballhawking community’s mode of communication and competetion

My mygameballs.com account
Specifically *my* account on mygameballs.com which has much more detailed stats than I have time to write about

Plouffe's New Hairdo
One of my new Minnesota friends, Tony Voda’s ballhawking/Twins/music-in-the-offseason-but-sometimes-during-the-season-too blog.

Steel City Ballhawk
A blog written by elite ballhawk, Nick Pelescak, about all of the games he attends, which is a ton since he is a season ticket holder at PNC Park.

The Ballhawker
The ballhawking blog of a fellow New York ballhawk, Chris Hernandez.

Zack Hample (The Baseball Collector)
Now If you are reading this blog there is a .00009 % chance that you haven’t visited this blog, but as a service to the reason this blog exists I want to have Zack add that .00009% to his viewership. It is the least I can do.

MLBlogs I Recommend and Follow

Ballparks on a Budget
Ever want to go to a baseball game outside of your local team but don’t want to empty the bank? Alicia Barnhart’s your girl with Ballparks on a Budget. She should know how to spend wisely in going to games because, well, she’s been to them all. Just last

Dodger Blue World
Just a great blog written by dedicated Dodger super-fan Emma Amaya.

Minoring In Baseball
A blog written by the father of just a family who are all fans of the West Michigan Whitecaps who is just a great guy in general: Michael David.

MLB.com Blogs Central
As the title kind of suggests, this blog is pretty much the center of the MLBlogs unvierse. It apply sometimes goes by the moniker: “MLBlogosphere”

The Ballpark Guide
A MUST-read for any MiLB afficionados, or even many MLB fans. Malcolm MacMillan goes to different ballparks all over and details his visit on the blog and writes tips for anyone going to that ballpark on his website (which can be found on the blog’s homep

The Next White Sox GM
If you were a baseball mind growing up, you may have gotten a comment from an elder female family member (usually grandma) saying, “You should be the one to run the team with all the knowledge you’ve got about baseball.” Well, here’s a kid who might just

The Unbiased MLB Fan
Matt Huddleston doesn’t root for the teams; he roots for the players. I wish I could say more, but I suspect any other explanation of his blog would be a multi-centennial-word ordeal.

Three Up, Three Down
One would assume not getting into the MLB Fan Cave is a sad experience. (Well, at least I would; I’ve never been old enough to apply.) However, this group of fans turned that usually-sad experience and turned it into a great blog where there are just a sl

MLBlogs I Recommend

Observing Baseball Classics

"The Baseball" Book Review
In this entry I reviewed/summarized the entirety of the book “The Baseball: Stunts, Scandals, and Secrets Beneath the Stitches” written by Zack Hample.

10/19/10 ALCS: Yankee Stadium
Sure I had no clue how to write it, but this was my first ballhawking entry ever and my only of 2010, so it falls under the category “classic”

Ballhawk Charities 2012
Where I went over the four ballhawk charities I had heard of at the beginning of the season as a way of helping them out by getting the word out.

Case Study on Morality in Baseball
A research paper I did way back in the summer of 2010. I don’t necessarily agree with everything I wrote back then anymore, but it does add an interesting perspective to things especially in today’s steroid talk.

Collected Baseball Knick-knacks
Quite simply: pretty much everything baseball-related that I had collected and managed to keep ahold of as of November, 20, 2011.

Dissecting/Deconstructing Baseballs
I’ve taken apart several baseballs before, and it was fun, so I decided to make a video of me taking apart a baseball and adding tips for other people to do so too.

Favorite MLB Players
I did probably one of my funner videos on who my favorite players were from the present day, when I first started watching baseball, and my favorite player that I never saw play at all.

Houlihan Park Tour and Snagging Analysis
This is my high school, Fordham Prep,’s home field, which being the manager of the varsity team for three years, I spent proabably more games here than at any other baseball field. So when I returned to my high school for a day, I took a quick tour of the

Observing Baseball Trivia
See the description of the link two links above, but modify it slightly so it fits this entry’s title.

Pitching Aces in the Playoffs
My first ever “real” entry that I ever wrote back on the surplus of star pitchers in the 2010 playoffs. It was pretty good considering I knew nothing about blogging, or writing in general for that matter.

Pure Genius
This is just me explaining how the Phillies got three aces of pitchers; nothing fancy. But it was me showing my first flash of general manager mind to the world, so that’s why I like it.

Sabermetrics (the explanation)
This was me explaining some simple sabermetric statistics for the people of the world who have heard of the stats but never really knew what significance they had/have over the more common metrics. I take pride in this because it can potentially educate s

Survey of Adults Perception of Baseball
I surveyed a bunch of my teacher as to which baseball player was there favorite; both in and outside of New York. It’s a bit more complex than that, but the only way to understand is to read the entry.

Tour Target Field in the Snow
Target Field is in Minnesota, so it only felt fitting that I should take at least one day to tour it while it was buried in the snow. And that’s what this entry was: a video of me going around Target Field while it was snowing and there was a ton of snow

Weird Observing Baseball Facts and Records
I may yet do this every year…and it would then become its own link category–but for the meantime–there is only one set of Observing Baseball Facts and Records, so it definitely goes under “Observing Baseball Classics”.

Blast from the Baseball Past

8/24/08 Dodgers at Phillies: Citizens Bank Park
My second ever game to CBP that ended with Pedro Feliz hitting a three-run walk-off home run while my dad and I were in the car because we had to catch a flight to Detroit seven hours later that same day in New York.

Obsevers of Baseball

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